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U.S. Now in Afghanistan Longer Than Soviets

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Posted on Nov 27, 2010
Soldiers in Afghanistan
Wikimedia Commons

U.S. Army troops from the 10th Mountain Division board a Chinook helicopter in Afghanistan in 2007.

Some records are made to be broken, from the 100-meter dash to Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest. But who would covet breaking the nine-year, 50-day Soviet record for its military campaign in Afghanistan? And the winner is … the USA. —JCL

Los Angeles Times:

As wartime days go, Friday was a fairly quiet one in Afghanistan. Helicopters skittered across the sky; convoys rumbled along desert roads; soldiers in mountain outposts scanned the jagged peaks around them.

But one thing set the day apart: With its passing, the length of the U.S. military’s campaign in Afghanistan matched that of the Soviet Union’s long and demoralizing sojourn in the nation.

The last Red Army troops left Feb. 15, 1989, driven out after nine years and 50 days by the U.S.-backed Afghan fighters known as mujahedin, or holy warriors. Ragtag yet ferocious, they were so spectrally elusive that the Soviet forces called them dukhi, or ghosts. A fitting term, perhaps, for a country that has been called “the graveyard of empires.”

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By squeaky jones, November 29, 2010 at 7:54 pm Link to this comment
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The U.S. Marines are sending about 15 M1A1 Abrams tanks to Afghanistan in December. The American government can not admit defeat, so countless lives will be lost to death and destruction. Just like Viet Nam in many ways.

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fearnotruth's avatar

By fearnotruth, November 29, 2010 at 2:26 am Link to this comment

Blame Bush, the useful-fool target of the shadow network’s 9/11 coup d’état ?!?!

Better blame Brzezinski and Gates - architects of ME policy to radicalize ME muslims and create an Arab Foreign Legion

Neo-cons, of course, got dragged in behind the Russians, realizing the perfect opportunity to exercise their Nietzchien craving for endless enemies (endless war) while enriching their friends - but ZBig’s back in the saddle

look for more and more proxy wars and endless terror on the run - his Al-CIA-duh will run like the Engergizer Bunny and his golden boy mountebank OBL is a legend with more lives than an Eveready Battery

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By SteveL, November 29, 2010 at 12:25 am Link to this comment

Think we will have finally taught them a lesson when we go broke??

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By Pete, November 29, 2010 at 12:04 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

@PatrickHenry “What do we win?”

Medals!

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Arabian Sinbad's avatar

By Arabian Sinbad, November 28, 2010 at 11:50 am Link to this comment

Time and again I predicted that Afghanistan would be the graveyard of the American evil empire as was the case with the evil Soviet Union empire.

In a sense this is good news for the world at large, though it is not good for Afghanistan. However, the Afghans should take pride that in a period of less than quarter of a century they were responsible for bringing down two of the most evil empires in human history.

God is Great!

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By PatrickHenry, November 28, 2010 at 11:38 am Link to this comment

What do we win?

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By Inherit The Wind, November 28, 2010 at 10:57 am Link to this comment

Blame Bush.  There was a “mission” in 2001.  He pulled the resources in 2003 for his war in Iraq. When the “mission”, which seemed easily feasible then became UN-feasible due to the starvation of resources, he simply changed the “mission”.  We would have been out of Afghanistan by the beginning of 2004, without Iraq.

He might have even legitimately been re-elected in 2004 if he had not gotten us into Iraq and finished up in Afghanistan before the election.

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By Ouroborus, November 28, 2010 at 7:55 am Link to this comment

Empire rules and everything in it’s way gets crushed.

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By Nozferatu, November 28, 2010 at 3:59 am Link to this comment

The people of Afghanistan are truly cursed….God help them get through all the bullsht the west has put them through.

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By SteveL, November 28, 2010 at 1:28 am Link to this comment

Stupid!

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